Where Now for Energy?

Energy was an issue, sort of, in the campaign, and in the aftermath there’s lots of chatter about whether, among other things, Obama will now approve the Keystone pipeline, or block it, as his enviro buddies demand. Whether he’ll regulate the heck out of hydrocarbon energy, or get out of the way of the extraordinary boom (and boon) the private sector unexpectedly dropped in his lap. (The shale gas boom surely didn’t hurt Obama in Pennsylvania or Ohio. The irony is that while the energy sector spent heavily against Obama, they also may have helped to save him. No good deed goes unpunished.) Keep in mind that expanded energy production is one painless route to higher federal revenues, and therefore a sweet spot in the budget cage match between the two parties.

In the meantime, herewith the second of the AEI “Energy 101″ videos I worked on with Ken Green. This particular script was mostly my idea; it came to me one day when I was behind a Ford Mustang at a stoplight, and my mind wandered to a meditation about how and why we still use “horsepower” as a measure of energy, even though no one really has the foggiest idea what a “horsepower” actually is (other than wanting a lot of them “under the hood”):